Exploring the sepulchral depths of the gothic imagination

Category Archives: Yuletide

“It was the Yuletide, that men call Christmas though they know in their hearts it is older than Bethlehem and Babylon, older than Memphis and mankind. It was the Yuletide, and I had come at last to the ancient sea town where my people had dwelt and kept festival in the elder time when festival was forbidden; where also they had commanded their sons to keep festival once every century, that the memory of primal secrets might not be forgotten.”

– H.P. Lovecraft (The Festival)

The Wild Hunt is at its peak and Yuletide is upon us in the wake of the Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year (for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere) and a time celebrated with sensual abandon as Saturnalia by the ancient Romans. Whatever name it may be called by, the season of Yule is of rebirth and new beginnings, as a new year begins and the days gradually begin to grow longer. And so to everyone I wish a blessed “Ghoultide season” and a very merry XXX’mas!